1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to print control apparatus, a print controlling method, and a program therefor. More specifically, this invention relates to print control apparatus for executing a printing job based on a request of printing, a print controlling system, a print controlling method, and a print control program that are for the print control apparatus.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, there are commercial printers (hereinafter, referring to printing contractor) who generate printed matters on requests from customers of individual users and business enterprises. Such printing contractors run a business of receiving provision of print data (original copy) and instructions of a print format, the number of copies, a date of delivery, etc. from a customer, forming a printed matter, and delivering it to the customer. These printing contractors perform their operations using large-scale equipment, such as offset reproduction printing machines known from long ago.
Moreover, in these days, printing devices of the electrographic method (also called printers) and printers of the ink jet method are being improved for higher speed and enhanced quality of picture. In connection with this, a business form of commercial printing which is called “Copy service,” “Printing service,” a “Print on Demand (POD) center,” etc. that is capable of outputting and delivering printed matters in a short time also exists.
A request of printing to these printing contractors is done by the user sending a manuscript written on paper or stored in an electronic medium and a print instruction on which the number of copies of the manuscript, a bookbinding method, an appointed date of delivery, etc. (an instruction on which a printing request, i.e., an order is written) by mail to the contractor providing the above-mentioned service or bringing it directly into a printing company. Electronic media includes the FD disk (floppy® disk), the MO disc (magneto-optical disc), the CD (compact disk)-ROM (read only memory), etc.
In addition, a system whereby the user gives an order of printing and sends a manuscript on line through the Internet or an intranet (a printing contractor receiving them similarly) has been put to practical use. The printing contractor accepts the request from the user, creates a print instruction, and manages scheduling for the printing job. Then, in accordance with the managed schedule, the printing contractor performs printing with a printer connected to a work computer and bookbinding, and delivers the formed printed matter to the user to complete its operations. For example, in a system “DotDoc.Web™” that sells printing services in the market, the user is requested to access a home page that the printing contractor provides from a computer of its own company, and fill necessary items, such as owner's information (destination where the printed matter is received etc.), print appearance, the number of copies. Then, by sending the form along with a manuscript file, the user can order printing of the manuscript.
Such printing contractors who execute printing jobs entrusted from users must complete printing so that the printed matters are with stable quality and in time for the appointed dates of delivery that were designated by the users. Moreover, in a large-scale printing center, a plurality of operators must process multiple printing requests (orders) in parallel sequentially using a wide variety of printers and work computers. Therefore, it is necessary to use resources of man power (operators who conduct operations), machines, etc. efficiently as much as possible.
As a more concrete problem existing on the printing contractor side, there is a problem of paper run-out that occurs randomly among a plurality of printers. With printing contractors as described above, basically the number of remaining sheets in each printer is not controlled. The operator is notified of paper run-out when it occurs, and feeds the paper as occasion requests. For this reason, the operator goes up to each printer when paper runs out and conducts paper feed, and consequently the work is very inefficient. Moreover, depending on timing, a printer is halted because of paper run-out, which refrains the operator to use a printing resource efficiently. In order to solve such a problem, for example, Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2002-262006 discloses a system of predicting when paper of a specific size runs out from a use state of the printer for a certain period of past time.
However, the system disclosed by the Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2002-262006, is for predicting paper run-out in a single printer, not considering such environments as “POD center” where a plurality of printers execute printing jobs in parallel. Although this system allows the operator to know a timing when paper goes short in each printer, but the number of paper feed operations for a plurality of printer is not reduced. For this reason, this system did not solve fundamentally the problem of lowering of efficiency due to randomly occurring paper run-out in the plurality of printers described above. Moreover, when paper run-out occurs with different printers almost simultaneously, depending on timings, it is often the case where the printers are halted, and the resource cannot be used efficiently. Therefore, there was still room for improvement of the conventional technology described above in a respect that a plurality of printers must execute printing jobs in parallel more efficiently.